Thread: Flathead Newbee Needing Direction!

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I had to go out earlier and had to sign off but here is some inspiration in a car I saw at last year's Richmond NSRA meet (2005). It is in a very nice fenderless '34 roadster which looked to be steel. Note here this engine uses a triple carb along with an alternator. The old Ford mount for the long generator in front messed up most triple carb installations but with a modern alternator there is more room for three carbs and thus you can install progressive linkage so that the engine runs off the center carb at low throttle but opens all three when you put the pedal to the metal. I think the engine in this picture represents some big bucks but it really looks good. As I see it the only way you can build up a flathead as I said before and others have agreed is to find a good block. All the other parts are expensive but available; it is the good block that is the key ingredient. Maybe it is easier to find a '49-'53 block and I only favored the 59AB because I think the cast bell housing to be stronger. Another problem that you might ask around about was a horrible condition called "clutch chatter" caused by a worn combination of flywheel face, throwout bearing and clutch. Everything could be fine in forward gears but in reverse, especiallly backing up an incline, a worn clutch could go into violent bucking where the whole car would oscillate throughout the drive line and loosen every bolt in the car. This was especially troublesome in a convertible; my '47 would shake your eye teeth out in reverse! All those unpleasantries are gone with an automatic trans, assuming your universal joints are in good condition. Anyway here is a picture of an engine that is just what you want, but I would not be surprised if there was $10K sitting right there. One other thing worth mentioning is that the Ford flathead had only three main bearing webs compared to five in a SBC and there used to be a girdle kit that bolted down over the main bearing caps to add strength but even then probably a modern dose of nitrous or some sort of blower can more easily destroy the bottom end than is the case for a SBC. Frankly, if I had unlimited money I would look for a '55 Dodge Red Ram hemi engine which is similar in size and displacement to the flathead with hemi heads but there were fewer of them built and so harder to find, but that would be my answer to a non-cookie-cutter engine. I say this because the ultimate setup for a flathead would be ARDUN heads (the original hemi heads) and rumor has it that they go for $30,000 or more if you can find a set. There was an engine shown on the FORUM a year or two ago with ARDUN heads but the archive seems to have been messed up somewhat so all you can do is search on "ARDUN" and maybe there will be some pictures of the ARDUN heads. So after seeing that you will understand why a hemi-head Dodge Red Ram engine might be a cheaper engine than an ARDUN-Ford setup. Here is a link to a picture of an ARDUN setup; 175 HP seems small today but to folks of that time most cars were running around 100 HP so a bolt-on 75% increase was fantastic at that time.

http://www.oogabooga.ca/oogaboogapag40.htm

Don Shillady
Retired Scientist/teen rodder